Beginning of a Happily Ever After
by inkheart9459
Summary: Everyone is finally back from the Underworld after weeks of danger with no Hook in tow. Regina's glad they're all safe, but now there's a great deal she has to get off her chest. She seeks Mal out and finds her under a willow tree in one of Storybrooke's parks and everything comes tumbling out.
Anon prompt from tumblr: "Things you said while you were crying"

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They finally make it back from the Underworld, without the pirate in tow. It all seems like a big waste of time, but really, Regina is relieved. Her town does not need a pirate with a derogatory attitude towards women that wants to turn one of the best women in town into a frilly housewife. Emma, for her part, is angry, so very angry. She isn't saying much and acting happy for the things she does say, but Regina can see through it all after these last few years. She's angry that she couldn't save the man she thinks she loves, she's angry at the world, she's angry at herself, but mostly she's angry at Jones himself for choosing to stay in the Underworld. He had built her up like every single other person in her life and then had looked at her and his brother and had found Emma wanting. How he did that, Regina will never know.

Now, back in town for the second day now, Regina finds herself walking into Mal's apartment complex, heart in her throat. She takes out her phone and texts Mal to make sure she's home before walking up the stairs and making her way to Mal's door. Her phone vibrates just as she's about to knock on Mal's door, but it's not the confirmation that Mal's home that she wanted. She's down the block at one of the smaller, quieter parks in Storybrooke. It's not ideal, and the summer heat outside reminds her of the Underworld, but it will do she supposes. She has a great deal she needs to get off her chest after this last adventure and Mal will be the only one who will really understand.

She walks down the block and finds Mal under a willow tree on the edge of a small pond. It's peaceful, only the sound of the wind through the trees and the birds surrounding them as she sits down on the grass and looks up at the bright blue sky. She forgot what colors looked like without being washed out by a tint of red. It almost hurts her eyes now, but she keeps looking anyway.

"Spill," Mal says simply, knowing exactly why Regina is there.

Regina sighs quietly before looking towards Mal. "A lot has happened since we left."

Mal snorted and rolled her eyes. "You don't say. It's not like you go to the Underworld every day, Regina. Hell, and I totally mean that ironically, until two weeks ago it wasn't supposed to be possibly but there's just something about Storybrooke that seems to keep bending the rules of magic that were laid out since time immemorial."

Regina hums. It's true. She's been wondering about that for a while now but all of her attempts to explain it haven't worked out. Maybe it's just bad writing on the part of the author. A headache begins to bloom at that thought, remembering that she actually was a storybook character who's actions could be influenced, if not outright controlled, by a man with a pen. That man was Henry now, but still, it is not a great feeling.

"You've heard how things have turned out already?" she asks, even though she knows the answer. Storybrooke's rumor mill is faster than the internet most days.

"Yup, pirate was a dumbshit, who would have guessed," Mal deadpans. "It wasn't like he was smart enough to change outfits every day let alone do anything more complicated."

Regina's lips quirk up in a half smile for a few seconds before the expression fades once more. "Yes, well, I'm not sad he's gone, but I'm sad it's hurt Emma."

"You're glad because it gives you a chance with her."

She feels the telltale sting of tears behind her eyes as she shakes her head. "It doesn't give me a chance with her, Mal. If there was anything I realized while we were down there it's that I'm not good enough for her. She's literally light personified and what am I? For God's sake if you give me a penis and a hook I would be that oaf. We're almost the same person."

"Oh please," Mal scoffs. "You are not. First off you actually know how to bathe, but secondly and more importantly you're a hero now. He never really was and you and I both know it. He was just following his dick where it led him and behaving how he had to in order to get some tail. The second anything he wanted more came around he was gone and he just proved that."

Mal's words are having no real effect on her. The urge to cry is still there. It's been a fraught few weeks. To be honest it's been a fraught few years ever since the curse broke. And that was made no better by the startling realization that she was falling slowly in love with Emma Swan just after Mal had come to town months ago. She's is just so done right now and all the walls that she's built over a lifetime and starting to crumble in the face of her own inadequacy and she's actually going to completely break down in front of someone for the first time since she was a child. There had been other times where she had cried in front of others, mostly since Emma had come to town, but she had managed to hold it together even then. Now, she can feel this will be different.

She leans her head on Mal's shoulders and looks up at the branches of the tree around them, gracefully brushing the ground and shifting the shadows around them. The first tears falls and she takes a deep breath. Then another. And another until she can't see, can barely breathe, with snot running down her nose, and the only thing that's holding her up is Mal who has wrapped an arm around Regina's shoulders and is just sitting silent sentry beside her as Regina mourns for the things she wants but can never be.

Regina manages to gain control of herself what feels like hours, but is probably only fifteen or twenty minutes later. Tears are still leaking out of her eyes but the wracking sobs are mostly gone. She takes a shuddering breath and turns to Mal, waving a hand and cleaning up her friend's shirt.

"Sorry."

Mal waves her off. "Consider it make up for the fact that I was never spit up on while raising Lily." A shadow crosses her face, but she comes out of it quickly. The old bitterness there is fading with every day she spends with her daughter learning about what she missed. "Besides, you're much more efficient about cleaning up."

Regina leans back against the tree and sighs. She does feel better after that. It's been so long since she's let herself be that vulnerable, if she ever really has considering her mother. She's learned so much from her family now that it's mind boggling.

"It's a moot point anyway," Regina finally says after a bit of silence. "She doesn't love me like I love her anyway. She'll get over the pirate and move on to someone else, someone who deserves her."

"And you're just noble enough to let her." Mal shakes her head. "Regina, I'm well aware of the fact that you fought for anything and everything you have now, but have you thought about fighting for this? It seems just as important to you as Henry. It's not like you don't know when to stop. If she said no you'd respect it and move on, actually move on, because right now you're just going to sit and stew over it. And really, you should give Emma a chance to say her piece before you decide for her. You of all people should know how bad that is."

Regina thought about that for a moment. Mal was right in a way. But then again…

"I don't want to ruin the little family we've managed to form just because I had to go and develop a crush on Emma. If that's all I get then I'll still be content."

"Content, Regina? You could be world endingly happy if only you took a chance. Isn't that what all the stories they tell about us are all about?"

It's on the tip of her tongue to say that evil doesn't get happy endings but she stops herself. She's not evil, not anymore. She has her penance still to pay for a long while for the things she did, but she's been redeemed on the back of a teenager with more faith in her than she ever had in herself and by the quite surety of a savior who knew that shades of grey were the norm. There are some days where that is hard to remember, however, and this is one of them.

She sniffles loudly, a fresh wave of tears course down her face, probably the last for this day. Regina can practically feel her tear ducts swelling shut as she's sitting there.

"Look at my past romantic relationships, Mal, none of them ended happily. Daniel was killed, god knows I don't count Leopold, you and I split though that is probably the best ending out of everyone, Graham was little more than a puppet, and Robin found his first wife and went off to be with her. Why should I subject Emma to that? It's clear I have no idea how to be in a relationship. I just want her to be happy and I don't think that's with me."

Mal clearly wants to say something but she's interrupted by a voice behind them. "Because maybe out of all of that it would be happily ever after."

Regina whips around and there's Emma five feet away from them, covered in a light sheen of sweat, in running shorts and one of her many tank tops. She looks a little sheepish at having eavesdropped, but otherwise her face is set and determined. Regina swallows hard and can't even begin to comprehend the sight in front of her and how it sends her stomach fluttering. God, Emma's arms are something to be admired, but that's not why she's here and she knows it.

"Don't fuck this up," Mal whispers from beside her, and then she's gone in a puff of black-purple smoke.

Regina looks at the place Mal just was with a betrayed expression. She's totally going to hear about that later.

"How can you believe in happily ever after, after all of this?" Regina asks, patting the ground beside her despite herself.

Emma drops herself to the ground beside her in that carelessly graceful way she has. "If you had asked me when I had first come to Storybrooke, I would have laughed about the idea of a happy ending, but now. Well, Regina, now I'm living in a town of fairytale characters and my parents are literally the epitome of the stereotype. I mean we keep getting villains from every single fucking story out there thrown at us, but they're sickeningly happy. They still fight, they still do everything a regular couple does, but here, I don't know, there's something in the air here that makes happily ever after stick when you find the right person."

"True love?"

Emma shrugs. "Maybe, maybe it's just hard work instead, maybe a little bit of both around here."

"What about you and Hook?" Her lip curls without her permission.

"Not going to lie, I beat the shit out of a punching bag for a good long while last night." She holds up her hands with swollen knuckles for Regina to see. "And then I downed most of a bottle of whiskey on my own. Then I sat up the rest of the night thinking. And I haven't been to bed yet, actually, but at this point I'm better off just staying up because god knows being sheriff around here has two settings and I probably need to be ready for shit hits the fan just in case tomorrow since it will have been all of like two seconds since we came back from hell and that means that someone's due to pop out of the well or whatever soon." She shook her head.

This was the most Emma-like that she had seen Emma act in months. It was making Regina's heart beat hard. Here was the no nonsense woman that had gotten lost in Hook. Here was the woman who stormed into her town and took it away from her along with her heart even if she hadn't known that at the time.

"I realized some things last night that I wouldn't have seen if Killian was still stuck up my ass. Or I was still stuck up his, whatever the case may have been. I didn't like who I was becoming, being with him. I always worry about whether people like me, subconsciously, but I never really let that affect who I am or what I'm doing. With him, it was the opposite. I molded myself into this image of what he wanted as this pretty little arm piece who had to depend on her man for everything, and that's just not who I am. I don't know why I didn't see it at the time, but I guess anger and booze are a good filter for things."

Regina snorts. "I usually find quite the opposite, but I do agree with what you're saying so I suppose it is what works for you."

Emma looks over at Regina, green eyes bright in the summer light. "Yeah, who knows, I've been a bit weird all my life, but then again as the child of Snow White and Prince Charming I suppose that makes more sense in hindsight."

"At least you don't talk to birds."

"God, fucking amen to that." Emma holds up the water bottle she had in one of her hands and tipped it towards Regina before chugging a fourth of it in a go. "I thought I'd be used to heat after being in hell for so long, but no. It's hot as ball out here."

"I've never understood that expression. Balls are technically colder than the human body." Regina's deflecting and she knows it but Emma smiles at her and so maybe it's worth it.

"Yeah, I know, but hey, colloquialisms don't have to make sense."

They sit a while, feeling the breeze, watching the sun move across the sky. The silence is easy between them and they don't see the need to break it. There's a lot to talk about but Rome wasn't built in a day and they don't have to talk about everything all at once either. It's a bit of a relief, really, but Regina really does need to know where they are at in all this now. Emma knows about her infatuation. It hasn't sent her running, but she needs to make sure it doesn't send her running in hindsight either. For a little while longer, though, she sits and just enjoys the moment.

They both finally push themselves up as the sun is starting to sink below the horizon, setting Storybrooke aglow with the same pink haze that the Underworld had. She looks at Emma in the soft light, seeing how it highlights her cheekbones and pulls out the brilliant gold in her hair and she thinks about how it was inevitable to fall for this woman no matter how they started. They were so alike and got each other in ways that no one else in town ever would. They fit. And even if they only ended up as friends that would never not be true.

"Walk you home?" Emma asks.

Regina nods. "Stay for dinner?"

"Always. Your cooking is to die for."

"You know, I'd rather you not die. Going back to the Underworld anytime soon isn't on my to-do list."

Emma laughs as she brushes herself off. "No, mine either, but those figures of speech again."

They start walking towards Mifflin Street together, falling in step easily even as Emma's stride is longer by just a bit. They find their rhythm. They always have.

Halfway back Regina finally looks at the other woman as the rest of the world goes on around them. "So where does this all leave us?" she asks, voice quiet but steady, for which she is thankful.

Emma thinks about that for a minute. Regina's glad for the thoughtfulness, but yet anticipation is killing her anyway.

"I think it leaves us as friends for now. I don't want to jump into anything right now right after Hook. That would probably be a disaster. If anything were to happen between us I'd want it to have a fighting chance, you know?"

"I do."

"So, maybe I'll let you know when I stop wanting to throw a things. Less than it was yesterday, it'll be less tomorrow, until it's finally just a good riddance he's gone."

"You did love him though, there's no devaluing that."

"I did." Emma looks off at a child of about ten walking a dog almost the same size as him, lumbering down the street. The kid is trying to get the dog to hurry on his way, but he won't be moved any faster than his plodding pace, but the child hasn't realized that just yet. Some things just can't be hurry, but that's a lesson learned with time. "But just because you love someone doesn't mean it's good for you and doesn't mean that after the fact you can't be mad as hell about what they made you."

"No, I don't suppose it does." And she would know more than anyone that Emma's words are true.

They reach the door of Regina's mansion a few minutes later. The front door is unlocked, meaning Henry is home from school and forgotten to lock up on his way in. Regina's gotten after him about that, but when there's not a big bag afoot he easily forgets. If she didn't know the crime rates intimately she might be more inclined to harp, but Storybrooke is for all intents and purposes a safe place and so she doesn't do much more than remind him every now and again.

Emma reaches out and stops Regina before they can move beyond the foyer. "I will tell you though, when I'm good again." Her eyes are earnest. "If there's anyone else in town that I think it would work out with, it'd be you. What's the harm in trying?"

Oh, there were hundreds of risks and she could name them all, but she was willing to risk it this one last time.

"Take your time, Emma. God knows I've traveled realms and you've traveled time I think we can wait just a little longer for the time to be right."

Emma smiles at her and it's so much like the sun that it takes Regina breathe away all over again and she wonders just when that will stop.

Then Henry is pounding down the stairs with that same smile on his face. "Moms!"

And the spell between the two of them is broken, but their family is together and that makes everything okay. She takes one last look at Emma and sees the same expression on her face and perhaps this will be the beginning of a happily ever after, after all.


End file.
